It is often necessary to provide a cardboard or paperboard box for packaging food items, even when said food items are already hermetically sealed in smaller packages. This is especially true when the individually wrapped food items are relatively small. By packing such items in a paperboard box, the items can be more easily handled, a reasonable number can be sold together at one price, and a larger surface area can be provided for displaying product information. Additionally, when the individual packages are of an irregular shape, a box can provide a form that is easy to stack, transport and store.
Such boxes must be sufficiently strong to retain several items and be stacked for storage and shipment. Environmental and economic concerns, however, require that a minimum of packaging material be used. Known boxes are often made of reactively thick cardboard or paperboard and may include separate dividers and supports to further increase the strength and rigidity of the box. When the items within the box do not substantially fill the box and thus contribute to the rigidity of the box, extra supports are also needed. Use of such constructions adds to the cost of the box, increases the difficulty of assembling the box and packing a product therein, and results in a relatively large amount of packaging waste to be disposed of.
It can be desirable to package products in boxes which allow the products therein to be viewed. This is done by providing openings in the box which may be covered by a thin sheet of transparent material. When the products are larger than the openings and are hermetically sealed in individual containers, the openings need not be covered with a transparent material. However, removing parts of a box to provide viewing openings therein weakens the box thereby requiring that thicker material or additional strengthening panels be used in the box interior.
Finally, it is well known to form boxes from flat cardboard blanks which can then be glued and folded to produce a desired box. Known boxes can require many separate gluing and folding steps in order to produce a box. If separator panels or strengthening panels are used, the additional steps of providing these panels and fitting or gluing them into a box become necessary. This tends to increase the cost and decrease the efficiency of the packing process.